We have some breaking news that we have just learned. A verdict has been reached by the jury in former President Donald Trump's Hush Money Fraud Trial. To be clear, a verdict has been reached. The jury has not been dismissed for the day, as was initially indicated here. We are getting our teams together and expect that we will get that information in a short period of time. The verdict has not been read to this point so far. Again, a reminder that the former President, Donald Trump, right now is facing a total of 34 separate counts. These counts relates specifically to an effort to try to cover up in the eyes of prosecutors a separate crime that was committed as related to the 2016 election by the former President. I want to get to Paul Callen, our attorney who's with us. Paul, when we said hello and goodbye to you a few moments ago, we thought that the jury was being dismissed for the day. It's only nine plus hours into its deliberation. They asked for a little bit of testimony to be reread. They asked for some of the jury instructions to be reread. And then in not too much time, they have come to some conclusion, what do you make of this and what do you think this indicates?

Wow, this is a real shocker. I really expected that they would be out at least until the end of the day tomorrow and probably into next week because of the number of charges.

There are 34 charges here that they have to go through methodically.

Here we go.

Let's listen. Laura, go. Guys, we need to go. We need to go. Go. Okay, here we go. We have our verdict, Savannah. Here we go. Count one, guilty. Count two, guilty. Count three, guilty. Count four, guilty. Count five, guilty. Count six, guilty. Count Count 22, guilty. Count 23, guilty. I'm pausing because it's coming in. Count 24, guilty. Count 25, guilty. Count 26, guilty. Count 27, guilty. Count 28, guilty. Count 29, guilty. Count 30, Guilty. Count 31, guilty. Count 32, guilty. Count 33, guilty. Count 34, guilty. That is 34 felony counts here. All guilty verdicts. Savannah and Lester, back to you. A total victory for the prosecution here.

Laura, the jurors obviously bought the prosecution case in full.

There was a consideration of whether or not they might split their verdict to compromise in some way.

That is not the case.

It's a total rejection of the defendant's case, Donald Trump's case.

We're starting to show you some of the scene outside the courthouse. We could actually hear it, Laura, as you were reading that verdict.

Just as you're digesting it, and I I know you're keeping your eye on the courtroom as well, what do you make of this verdict?

Savannah, it's a resounding victory for this prosecution in a case that they pitched as something far greater than about hush money. The way they tried to cast this case was about the subversion of democracy, and today, the jury agreed with them. Savannah, the former President has tried to cast this as a political prosecution, a political hit-but job by a Democratic elected DA, by a judge that was biased against him. But these 12 jurors, these 12 New Yorkers, have come to a different conclusion, an independent conclusion, that the former President of the United States is guilty of 34 felony accounts. You can hear the crowd here. There's a lot of Trump supporters out here that you can hear are very worked up. As I was reading the verdict, I could hear the crowd, emotion growing behind me. I'm only a couple of yards away from the area that you can see on your screens right there, the First Amendment area, if you will. It's just a stone throw away from the press area. It's been growing as the day went on. It's growing after they heard that this verdict was coming in. A lot of emotions running very high in this city right now.

Again, this is the presumptive GOP nominee in the middle of an election year for things that he did that the prosecution said he did to try to corrupt the last election. A just remarkable scene playing out right here in Lower Manhattan. If you can hear me, there's a lot of passion in this park right now. The former President has alleged a couple of times that because of the police presence here, the protesters, demonstrators weren't able to come. They absolutely can, and this crowd is growing here. I've been talking to people who are happy about this verdict, people who are devastated about this verdict.

You just saw this man with a passionate...

I also just met this gentleman.

What's your name, sir?

Jeffrey.

Jeffrey, what is your reaction as we're all just taking this right now?

Well, we're watching the legal system work the way it's supposed to work in a democracy. Three equal branches of government. No one is above the law. He was indicted by a jury of his peers. This was not political.

This was not Joe Biden, despite the alt-right rhetoric.

It was a grand jury indictment and now a jury conviction of his peers. This is the legal system working, and this is how America is supposed to work. I feel very happy for America.

I feel very happy for democracy because this is how it's supposed to work.

Jeffrey, thank you so much. I appreciate it.

Lester Savannah, back to you.

This was a disgrace. This was a rigged trial by a an afflicted judge who was corrupt. It's a rigged trial, a disgrace. They wouldn't give us a venue change. We were at 5% or 6% in this district, in this area. This was a rigged, disgraceful trial.

But the real verdict is going to be November fifth by the people, and they know what happened here, and everybody knows what happened here.

You have a sore respect DA and the whole thing.

We didn't do a thing wrong.

I'm a very innocent man, and it's okay. I'm fighting for our country. I'm fighting for our Constitution. Our whole country is being rigged right now. This was was done by the Biden administration in order to wound or hurt an opponent, a political opponent. I think it's just a disgrace. We'll keep fighting.

We'll fight till the end and we'll win because our country has gone to hell.

We don't have the same country anymore. We have a divided mess. We're a nation in decline, serious decline. Millions and millions of people pouring into our country right now from prisons and from mental institutions, terrorists, and they're taking over our country. We have a country that's in big trouble. But this was a rigged decision right from day one with a conflicted judge who should have never been allowed to try this case. Never.

We will fight for our Constitution.

This is long from over.

Thank you very much.

The judge has just announced a sentencing date. Let's go back to Laura for that. What are you hearing?

Yeah, guys, it's interesting. This came up right away, and the prosecution made a suggestion about sentencing, and the defense attorney made a suggestion asking for a sentencing in mid to late July, pointing out that the former President faces other charges in other jurisdictions. Remember, this is just one of four different criminal cases, perhaps the only one that will reach a conclusion before election day. The former President's lawyer pointing to that as a reason to put off sentencing for a little while. The judge announcing sentencing will be on July 11th, guys. July 11th at 10:00 AM, the former President will face sentencing. Again, as I mentioned before, the people, the defense, are now going to put in motions and briefs about what they think the appropriate sentencing will do, and then what an appropriate sentence would accomplish. It's interesting. They're not really discussing any of the conditions of release quite yet. I'm going to wait for more information about that before I delve into that, guys. But for right now, July 11th is sentencing.

This is the first time a former president has been convicted of a crime. Nbc news, presidential historian Michael Beshlaus joins us now. Michael, how do you begin to put this moment into context? Well, this is almost surreal, Lester. We'll all remember where we were when we got this news today. That's because, as you've been saying, first time anyone who has been President has been convicted of criminal conduct. Also someone who, six weeks from this day, just about, Donald Trump is likely to be nominated by the Republicans as their presidential candidate. It's going to be divisive. A lot of people will be angry. But 50 years ago this summer, the Supreme Court told President Richard Nixon he had to give up his secret tapes. They showed that he was probably guilty of a number of criminal offenses. Gerald Ford pardoned him, but Gerald Ford, the new President, respected the rule of law. He didn't say the system was rigged. What Gerald Ford said in his inaugural address was, this is a system that shows that this is a government of laws are not of human beings. The people rule. This, obviously, Michael, is not in isolation.

This is occurring during a historically difficult time in terms of division in this country. Is there a historical analogy about how the country might move forward from this moment? Well, for more than two centuries, we've had a lot of very controversial legal verdicts before the Civil War, at the time of the Cold War. You and I could list them for the next three hours. But the point is that here Where we are still standing, we're still a Republic. The DNA of America is to respect the rule of law, even if we disagree with it. There can be peaceful protest, a guilty party can appeal, but in the end, we always respect the rule of law. That's the essence of our country. All right. I appreciate your perspective as always, Michael. Thank you.

President Biden's re-election campaign, swiftly responding, as you can imagine, to the guilty verdict today, saying, No one is above the law. For more on Biden's response, I'm joined tonight by Peter Alexander, who's live for us tonight. Peter, talk to me about how they're balancing this, because this is a little complicated, because the President has made it clear they had nothing to do with this case, but the campaign wants to remind voters this just happened and this was huge.

Tom, let's walk you through this. We're not expecting to hear from President Biden about Mr. Trump's conviction tonight. That's where we're being told he's in Delaware right now with his family. This is the anniversary of his son, Bo's death. The campaign, though, did put out that statement. They say the conviction shows No one is above the law. They add that there is still only one way to keep Donald Trump out of the oval office. They say at the ballot box, they add, Convicted felon or not, Trump is going to be the Republican nominee for President. The White House putting out a very short statement. They say, We respect the rule of law. The campaign and the White House, they've largely steered clear of commenting on this trial, but amid frustrations about the wall-to-wall coverage making it harder to break through with its message. This week, the Biden campaign deployed Robert De Niro, two of the police officers who were attacked at the Capitol on January sixth to speak at the courthouse. We saw De Niro trading insults with Trump supporters there. But to your question, specifically, late tonight, a Democratic strategist familiar with the campaign's thinking is telling us that in their view, a conviction is better than an acquittal, but they say it is not going to be a central message for the campaign.

We should note that the campaign did immediately start fundraising off it. Ultimately, they say that President Biden is going to need to convince Americans that Mr. Trump's chaos and lawlessness, in their words, is It's not just bad for Mr. Trump, but also bad for Americans' lives. The bottom line, though, Tom, and I think this is really the view privately, is that they acknowledge they don't think that either way this is dramatically going to change this race. They think this isn't resolved until November, in effect.

All right, Peter Alexander. Peter, I have one more question before you go. You know the President so well, you know the former President so well. We have this debate coming up at the end of June or July. I'm looking at the calendar now. But we have this debate coming up. Do you think this becomes a large part of President Biden's strategy? Does he remind voters that we're talking to a convicted felon here? You're going to elect the convicted felon. Do you think that becomes part of the language we hear in this campaign?

I think the White House, excuse me, campaign officials privately say they don't think it'll be a big part of the campaign. They'll raise money off of it. They'll try to motivate their base off of it. But they recognize this thing is going to be decided at the margins, Tom. To do that, according to a senior campaign that I spoke to just within the last couple of hours, they think this still comes down to the key issues that they have to zero in on with voters, issues that we have discussed that they have said multiple times before, the topic of democracy, the topic of abortion rights, and really what they view as not just the economy, but in their language, trying to demonstrate to Americans which one of these candidates cares most about the middle class. At the end of the day, that's what's going to motivate voters in their eyes. There could have an impact on the margins. Some independents have said this could sway the way that they vote, but really, they need to get Americans to care about what's in it for me, not just how it affects Donald Trump.

Peter Alexander with new reporting tonight for us. Peter, we always appreciate that. And what started off as a quiet day two of jury deliberations took a 180 real quick, with a group of 12 New Yorkers finding former President Donald Trump guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records. In other words, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee is now the first former US President to be found guilty of a crime. And we don't know yet if that verdict is going to result in probation or Trump sitting in prison, but we will find out on July 11th. That's just four days before he's scheduled to step on the stage for the Republican National Convention. Just shortly after the verdict was announced, the Trump campaign wasted no time sending out a fund Raising email in which Trump said in all caps, I am a political prisoner. Let's bring in NBC's Halley Jackson. Halley, first and most obvious question here for so many Americans tonight. How likely is it that Trump is physically Is he physically going to be put in shackles and booked into a prison here?

Not likely. Just totally candidly here, we know in the sentencing is going to be, Gatti, and it's good to be with you tonight on this really historic evening here with these guilty convictions now for former President Trump. Here's the deal. He's going to be sentenced on July 11th. From what legal experts have told us, it is unlikely that the former President will end up behind bars. Obviously, that is a possibility. There is a chance that it happens. But remember, he is a first-time offender. This is a non-violent set of crimes that he's been convicted these falsification of business records here. The guidance from the folks who are immersed and steeped in the law of it all is that it is unlikely that Judge Mirshawn would sentence him. Listen, if it happens, there is this dynamic of the secret service. Remember, this is somebody who is entitled to and who gets secret service protection by dint of being formerly in the White House here, Gatti. That is a dynamic that's at play here. One legal expert has suggested there are other options. If there were to be some confinement, there are other options that the judge could do, for example, home confinement, et cetera.

Again, that does seem outside the realm of likelihood here, but just want to give you a sense of what's on the table.

Always love that, Halley Jackson, realism. Halley, Donald Trump notably saying that the real verdict is going to be on November fifth by the people. Can you give us an overview of what bearing you see this having on the election?

Yeah, it's a great question, Gatti. I think it is one that at this point, at least as we sit here on May 30th, is unanswerable, at least for now. Now, there are some signals that we've gotten from polling previously that suggests that two-thirds to three-quarters of Americans, when polled over the course of the last month, say that whatever happens here, whatever the guilty or not guilty situation was, isn't going to change their vote. They're going to vote the same way regardless. That said, when you look at the numbers, about a 10% to 23% of independent voters have suggested that a conviction would make them less likely to vote for former President Trump. We know that about 60% of independents believe that the charges brought in this hush money case are serious. Why does that matter? 10%, that's not a big number. 20%, not a huge number here. But this is a very close election, and it is independent voters who are going to be critical in determining who ends up in the White House come November. All that said, it is different to pull a hypothetical than it is to pull a reality. Now that this reality is in front of voters, what will they say moving forward at this point?

The reaction from both candidates will matter. There's something interesting that has happened here, too, Gatti. A rare moment of agreement between Donald Trump and Joe Biden here because both of them say that the political verdict is going to come from the American people in November.

Halley, this is one of those days where you log on to the Internet and it seems like everyone's an expert. And yet there are some people who have been watching this following all the ins and outs of this case and are still tonight like, wait, I know it's 34 felony counts, and I know that it has to do with that one payment to Stormy Daniels. But what's he guilty of in layman's terms here? You're so much better than I am at breaking this down. But Is it basically lying on business records to cover up this payoff and affect the 2016 election?

You are great at this, Gatti. I would just slightly tweak what you've said here, which is this. The actual charges, the actual counts that he was convicted on are 34 counts of falsification of business records. 34 counts because it involved a series of checks, entries into the general ledger, and invoices from Michael Cohen. It's these documents. It's literally pieces of paper. It's records. That is the The actual counts that he's been convicted on here. Now, they are felony counts. Typically, they'd be misdemeanors. They are felony counts because the jury has now decided that there was essentially an object crime, that he was doing this falsification in subject of a second criminal offense by unlawful means, essentially. That is election interference. That is the case that the prosecution laid out, that it was essentially to try to interfere in the 2016 election. That is what he has found guilty of. I will say this, it is not illegal to have an NDA, a nondisclosure agreement. That is not against the law. The piece of this that this jury has decided is against the law that he's been convicted on is essentially making those payments as almost like a campaign contribution to help him on the campaign without actually reporting it.

That's what this really all comes down to here.

All right. Halley, feel free to reel me in here, but his defense seemed to be very much like, I didn't know what was going on. I'm a busy man. I had no idea. It seems like this The conviction is like, Yeah, you did. You knew what was going on, and it was fraudulent, and you lied, and you were responsible for what happened.

Is that oversimplifying? The issue of intent was central to this. Did he have the intent to try to conceal a crime here? And so the jury has found by finding him guilty on all 34 counts, and there was a question, maybe it would be a mixed verdict that they would quit him on some counts, find him guilty on the others. That's not the case. It's 34 for 34 here as it relates to a guilty verdict from the jury. And so essentially, the issue of intent is one that the jury found exists here for former President Trump. Now, his defense took a couple of different tax. It was, Hey, these weren't falsified. This wasn't illegal in the first place. But the other thing he tried to do was to seriously discredit, tried to discredit, the prosecution star witness here, Michael Cohen, whose testimony was front and center in this case. He is somebody who is acknowledged lying to a lot of various entities, to a lot of various people here. The defense went after him again and again, hammered him to basically cast doubt on his credibility to say to the jury, wait a second, you're going to believe Michael Cohen?

You're going to believe this guy here? Clearly, the jury, by virtue of the verdict that they came back with, did find Michael Cohen to be to a It's very credible here. I will note that the prosecution made a point, and you heard it in the closing arguments from prosecutors here. They made a point to say, Almost everything that Michael Cohen said to you is backed up by documents, by receipts, by other evidence as well.

A lot of receipts in this one. The sentencing, we're looking at four days before the Republican Convention. That is such a clash of court and campaign calendars. Does this further galvanize the GOP behind Trump? Or is there a possibility that we could see any breakup or any schisms form?

We have seen none so far. We have seen, in fact, the opposite, Gatti, which is the Republican Party moving very quickly to back up former President Trump as it relates to his claims that this was in his words or in his view, I should say, I'm paraphrasing, a Sham trial, that this was rigged, et cetera. Starting with the most powerful Republican in the Congress, which is the speaker of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, who came out almost immediately calling this a shameful day in American history. There is a laundry list of Republican lawmakers who have come out and echoed that sentiment, including many who were on the short list to potentially be the former President's running mate here. I will say this as you talk about the calendar. Just to tell you the real talk, Gatti, Judge says July 11th. We see this in our I have notes coming in from our team in the courtroom that sentencing is July 11th. Immediately, I pulled up my Google calendar and I said, That is four days before the Republican Convention is supposed to start, because mid July is a critical moment. That is when the current presumptive Republican nominee, who has now been convicted of these felonies will be the, we don't have to say the word presumptive anymore.

He is expected to be the nominee. And the other collision course here, too, is this veepstakes race because the former President has suggested he will not pick a running mate until closer to the convention, until maybe in early July. You look back to 2016, he selected Mike Penses as running mate, or at least formerly announced it just three days before the start of that year's convention. So might you have this moment where the former President is naming a running mate, getting sentenced for felonies, and then going and showing up to be nominated for the Republican presidential nomination. That is entirely in the realm of possibility.

Yeah, I think you just replaced the word election in my brain with collision course. Halley Jackson, thank you so much for joining us.

Thanks, Scott.

We're going to look for more on this verdict and to dig a little bit more into the legalities of everything, I want to bring in Adam Kaufman. He's a former assistant district attorney with the Manhattan district Attorney's office. Michael Van der Veen, a former Trump lawyer and criminal defense attorney, and Lannie Davis, Michael Cohen's former lawyer and legal advisor. Lanie, I'm going to start with you. Have you had a chance to speak with Michael Cohen tonight? And even if you haven't, talk to us about his headspace. He was called the greatest liar of all time. He was trashed by the Trump defense team, and he stood there for hours testifying. What does today mean for him?

So first of all, I haven't talked to him. I'm no longer his lawyer, and I want to focus on the evidence. But I have said many, many times, Michael Cohen was found to be truthful under tough cross-examination in front of New York Supreme Court Judge, Angaran, in the financial fraud case. The judge wrote that he was credible and truthful. The tactic of using the entire defense to shout names in a courtroom when they're not evidence and not provide any counter to documents that do not lie means that this verdict was a verdict based on the facts and the documents.

Michael, you represented former President Trump. You worked with him. How hard is it to work with him? Because some people have said that Todd Blanch, he had a case to present to the jury, but he also had a case to present to his client, former President Trump, and that can be difficult.

Yeah, I'm not sure how much I really make of that. My experience was that he was a very good client. He was easy to work with. I found him, first of all, to be a pretty humorous guy. He seemed intent on giving you what he thought were the important points that he wanted to make. But he gave us a free in, both in the impeachment trial and then in the Manhattan trial.

Well, I ask you about that because some people said that maybe Blanch had some missteps in the closing arguments and bringing up people like Bob Costello in trying to relitigate Stormy Daniels. Those were missed opportunities.

I don't know. I thought Blanche did a good job. I thought he's a very good lawyer. I think he did a good job. Frankly, this is a historic trial. What he was able to accomplish in this trial was much more important to him than, Am I going to get another case from Donald Trump? He's in the history books.

But he lost the case.

He did lose the case, but he defended the case in a way that I think was probably much more motivated by what's the best defense that I can put on rather than, Hey, I'm going to please my client. We all usually have conflicts with our clients, and there are a lot of disagreements. But there are only two decisions in this case that were Donald Trump's and Donald Trump's alone. That was to plea not guilty, and that was to testify or not. Otherwise, He has input into the case, and the lawyer has input in the case. Those are his decisions. That second decision probably had an effect on this trial.

Adam, was this case winnable for the defense? It's really a hard case to win. But it's untested legal theory. But that's a different issue. There's the issue of it's an untested legal theory. The jury doesn't know and doesn't care that it's an untested legal theory. They don't know that. What they hear is the evidence in the courtroom. You look at the documents, and I agree, Cohen was well-corroborated, and that's so important in a case like this. But so the legal theory, the untested nature of it, that's going to be an issue that might be hashed out on appeal, but not in the courtroom. I'm just trying to understand because in looking at this case, there were key witnesses that never showed up to trial, that were never called by either side, including Alan Weiselberg, the man... Go ahead.

We go. Weiselberg tested, fined in our trial. Weiselberg Weiselberg didn't testify because Weiselberg has showed 100% support and loyalty to the President. So he wasn't going to take the stand and say anything that the prosecutors wanted the jury to hear. Weiselberg was gone to jail twice for his loyalty and would have been willing to go a third time if somebody thought, again, he perjured himself and we're going to charge him again.

Laine, you worked with Michael Cohen. You were his lawyer. Michael Cohen obviously has a reputation that can be debated by both sides. Do you think that Michael Cohen has finally received justice? I mean, he did a hard time. He defended Donald Trump till the end until he didn't. His family was put through so much, and now Donald Trump is a convicted felon.

Look, I'm a former lawyer for Michael, so I just have to follow certain rules and not comment about Michael. But I can say what I've previously said. Every word that he testified to was backed up by documents, including Mr. Weiselberg, who wrote down $130,000 multiplied it by two to take care of income taxes. And yet Donald Trump's defense was that number was legal fees. If you lie about that number being about legal fees, when everybody, certainly the jury and everybody knew That number was about Stormy Daniels. That's the end of the defense. You lie about legal fees, then the conspiracy can be believed by the jury that he knew he wasn't paying legal fees to Stormy Daniels. He lied and recorded them as legal fees. That, to me, is the logic of the jury looking at that document, and that document speaks for itself. Weiselberg was the most important witness against Mr. Trump because Because of his own handwriting and what I just said.

Reasonable doubt. They needed one juror. They couldn't get there. I don't know if you can describe the jurors getting to this verdict in a fast manner. It seemed fast to me. I didn't go to law school. I bring all this up because it sounds like the prosecutors convinced the jury easily. Because they got back, they wanted to hear the instructions once again, and it was unanimous on all the counts. My question to you, Adam, Because you guys were talking about the defense. Was the case winnable or was it over from the get-go? Look, anytime a criminal case goes to trial, as defense attorneys, we know it's difficult for the defense. The prosecution gets up there, they put on their case, and most criminal cases that go to trial end up as convictions. The prosecution did a great job. I think there were some missteps by the defense. I think that I would have talked more about the fact that Weiselberg wasn't called. Why wasn't he called? He's the one, right? I think that putting on... One thing to think about is the defense doesn't have any burden, and so they can sit back and do nothing and just poke holes at the people's, the prosecution's case.

When they put on a witness, now it gives the jury something to balance, something to weigh. If you're going to put on a case, it's got to be more than Castello, because now you're putting... You go from having nothing, and the jury just has focus on the prosecution case, and then you put something up there, it's so feather-light that now the jury is weighing the two sides. Michael, would you put up more of a defense?

Witness-wise, you mean?

Witness-wise, case-wise, I mean?

Probably not. Generally, in a criminal defense case, it's the government's burden, and you don't put on too many defense witnesses. It's cross-examination. We make our living on cross and closing. We don't do a lot of direct examinations. But I want to tell you, a A year ago, we did a mock jury trial on our trial, and we did deep dive jury questionnaires and evaluation of the Manhattan jury pool. Eight and a half out of 10 people had very strong feelings against the President. The other one and a half just didn't like him.

It was hard to win a case in Manhattan, is what you're saying?

Yeah, it was hard to win a case in Manhattan, but I have such faith in the jury system. I mean, it really is the best system that we have. I'm a It's a little disheartened because the presumption of innocence and that guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, from when it was first written to where it is now is really eroded.

We only have 30 seconds. Does he have a chance for an appeal?

I think he's got a couple of issues on appeal. Absolutely. In the jury instructions, probably there's some issues on appeal, some of the trial evidence that came in.

There's a couple of issues there that will be interesting. Okay, guys, we thank you so much for being here.

Thanks for watching. Stay updated about breaking news and top stories on the on the NBC News app or follow us on social media.